A selection of the latest news stories and editorials published in Iranian news outlets, compiled by Ali Alfoneh and Ahmad Majidyar. To receive this daily newsletter, please subscribe online.

(E) = Article in English   

Politics

  • Asr-e Iran reviews news stories in the Iranian press on the 2013 presidential election:
    • "Hashemi Rafsanjani will not run for president... "[Rafsanjani:] I told Mr. Nateq Nouri: 'Your physical condition and age is better than mine; you should run.' He said the same thing about me. But it was all chatter. I said I no longer can run, and Mr. Nateq Nouri too made an excuse." 
    • Foumani, reformist political activist mentions Rafsanjani, Mohammad Khatami and Mohammad-Reza Aref as potential reformist candidates for the 2013 presidential election.
    • Mohammad-Ali Najafi, former education minister, says there is no consensus among the reformists for Mohammad Khatami's candidacy.
    • Hossein Kamali and Esmaeil Haghparast from the Islamic Work Party express readiness to run for president.
  • Asr-e Iran provides background information on the Supreme Leader's provincial trips.

Diplomacy

  • President Ahmadinejad appoints new ambassadors:
    • Hamid Bayat, the Foreign Ministry's Middle East and North Africa Directorate director general, and former ambassador to the Sudan: Denmark
    • Mohsen Pak-Ayin, head of the Foreign Ministry's Afghanistan Bureau, and former ambassador to Thailand, Uzbekistan and Zambia: Azerbaijan
    • Ali Najafi Khoshroudi, the Foreign Ministry's director of the Commonwealth of the former Soviet states office : Kyrgyzstan
    • Mansour Chavoshi: North Korea
    • Mohammad-Jalal Firouznia, former director of the Persian Gulf and Middle East Directorate, and former ambassador to Yemen and Bahrain: Malaysia
    • Ali-Akbar Sibouyeh, Foreign Ministry Translation Bureau director and deputy ambassador to Tunisia: Oman
    • Morteza Asayesh Zarchi, former ambassador to Oman, former Yugoslavia, Croatia, and Chile: Qatar
    • Mehdi Agha-Jafari, former Ambassador to Bahrain: Tanzania
    • Lotfollah Bakhtiari: Sierra Leone
    • Alireza Kasayi, head of the Central Asia and Caucasus Group of the Foreign Ministry's Center for Political and International Studies: Mali.
  • Esmaeil Kowsari, parliamentarian and Revolutionary Guards commander, ridicules the British Defense Minister's statements concerning the prospects for anti-regime uprisings because of rising prices.

Military and Security

Economy

  • Hojjat al-Eslam Kazem Sediqi, temporary Tehran Friday prayer leader:
    • "Had our authorities devised better policies, our costs would have been reduced... Executing the subsidy reforms was courageous, but they handed out cash to the people, and infused it in the market rather than strengthening production. The money was not used to boost production... And this has some side effects... They should already have thought about it. We hope that the problems people are facing and some are using as a pretext to help the enemy will not be repeated..."
    • "Paying attention to the issue of production, using Iranian products and [supporting] the national production is a necessary [issue], and the order of religion, God and the Quran. God would never be happy with the Muslim community of believers... being in the shadow of infidels. We are a blessed nation, and they should not dominate us economically."
  • Parliamentary Speaker Ali Larijani says execution of the second phase of the reform of the subsidies plan is not "expedient for the country."
  • According to Azadi News, the government has transferred cash handouts to the bank accounts of the public. 

Media

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